March 15, 2006

Backyard hog farmers in Philippines switching to organic feed

More backyard farmers in the Philippines are shifting to organic feed technology because of the low capital input and increasing demand of organically raised pigs in the market.

Rural farmers are adopting this technology as high costs of commercial feeds took away most of the profits. Farmers have to raise at least four pigs to break even if they are using commercial feeds. By using organic feeds sourced from locally available materials, farmers were able to lower production costs and thus earn more profits.

Meat of pigs fed with the organic feeds are also said to be tastier than those fed on commercial feeds and are therefore more in demand.

Pig raisers in three northern villages in the town of Sagada in the Mountain province about 275 km north of Manila are now deploying a new organic feed introduced by a Catholic priest.

The feed is processed by cutting and mixing together camote tops, banana stalks, rice bran and corn grits, and fermented by mold for four days.

The pig raisers can produce their own mold by wrapping cooked rice with manila paper inserted inside a bamboo tube. The tube is then buried for four days in which mold would have grown on the rice.

With the processing of mold in four days and another four days for fermentation, the feed takes at least eight days to produce.

Pig raisers usually feed their animals with cut camote leaves or cooked banana stalks which they mix with commercial feeds.